Sunday, February 21, 2010

History research needs to be checked and double-checked!

Here's a link to a NY Times story about a new book on the Hiroshima bombing which has some of its facts quite messed up. Read the story. It's a great lesson to all of us who write history that facts need to be checked with at least two sources (or if that's not possible, at least reported to the reader as unverifiable). As you'll see when you read the story, the author took one person's word for what happened and apparently did not check any other sources for verification.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/21/books/21hiroshima.html?emc=tnt&tntemail0=y

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Memoir of a death penalty lawyer

This review, from today's New York Times, talks about a new memoir written by a death penalty lawyer. For anyone interested in the death penalty today, this would be a good place to start.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/books/review/Lithwick-t.htmlhttp://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/books/review/Lithwick-t.html